


Expressed Potential

by Tammany



Series: In Potential [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: First Time, Friends to Lovers, M/M, who you gonna call?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-09
Updated: 2016-02-09
Packaged: 2018-05-19 07:57:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5959609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tammany/pseuds/Tammany
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ok. People wanted to see some more of what would happen in the "In Potential" timeline. I wrote. This is what came out.</p><p>The two boys are not talkative in this. While much of my work is a dance of words and silent negotiations, this is a bit different, as in this the boys actually are very much in sync--in the prior one and in this. There are not many words, and a lot more mutually approved actions. For those who like words--and I am one--it may require the stretch of remembering that most people, and definitely many men, prefer actions and reactions over verbal theses and antitheses culminating in a chatty synthesis and restatement.</p><p>I do hope that it is clear, happy, and enjoyable to read.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Expressed Potential

Lestrade reviewed the application for secondment to the College of Policing at Hendon. He’d filled it in on his computer, then printed it out. He’d run it up to his supervisor at the MET. He’d run it over to his OTHER supervisor at MI5. He’d assembled all the paperwork, including his service record, his academic records, copies of his diplomas.  All that was left to do was to sign all the lines on all the forms, then pile it into an envelope and send it out.

He picked up a pen from his desk. He hovered it over the first blank space…

He realized his hand was shaking.

He put the pen down, and took a long, slow, deep breath—the kind they always called “cleansing” for some reason. Down, down, down, hoooooold. Release.

And in again.

And out.

“Bugger,” he growled when cleansing breaths failed to do damn-all.

He couldn’t remember the last time anything had frightened him—not this way. The rush of adrenaline chasing down a dark alley toward gunfire instead of away? That, yeah, sure. That was good, healthy fear. This was something less wholesome, and it was rattling him. Every step of the process of preparing to leave his current job and begin a long-term shift to teaching terrified him.

Donovan stuck her head in the door and looked at him. A frown creased between her brows.

“Oi—I need to trot you over to the A&E? You don’t look so good.”

‘Don’ feel so good, either, Sal,” he said. He pushed at the papers in front of him. “This…it’s got me buffaloed.”

She didn’t need to be told what “this” was. She’d been among the few he’d taken into his confidence once he’d decided to try for the “second career” Mycroft Holmes had suggested. Sally cocked her head.

“It’s the right move,” she said, voice permitting no questions. “You’ll be great at it.”

“Yeah—if they take me,” he said. “Maybe. Or—I don’t know. I just…”

He could feel his pulse—feel it as badly as he could after a mile sprint after a perp ending in a bit of a scuffle…

“Boss, stop it. Right now, just send in the damned paperwork.”

“I need to check it one more time.”

“No, you don’t,” she said, snatching at the heap with a fierce glower.

He pulled it all away just in time. “Sally…”

“Send it. Or I swear, I will sneak in tonight, steal it, and send in myself. Hell, I’ll pay the postage on that monster, just to see it gone.”

“One more person—I want one more person to look at it. Aw’right?”

She sighed, and shook her head—but gave in. “One more. Only one. You’re not a little kid, boss, and this isn’t like a song before bed. Do it.” She spun away, still clucking and muttering.

He clung to the heap of papers, leaving faint smudges where his damp fingertips dug in.

After he was sure she was gone, he let go, and groped for his mobile.

_Help._

He looked down at the one word glowing on the screen, aimed at Mycroft but not yet fired. He considered the time Sherlock had sent a similarly non-specific plea for help. He grinned, wondering if Mycroft would send the helicopters to rescue him.

He really didn’t want to know. He tapped a bit more.

_Help. This is all your fault. It was your idea. Need you to read over my application to Hendon._

He felt odd. It had been…

He didn’t know how long it had been since he’d had anyone to send a text like that. A plea for help. A request for support that wasn’t couched in the formal work codes that would send teams of trained police and spies—but no reliable friends. Yet something had changed the day he’d first asked Mycroft Holmes his advice about a second career. As new and fragile the relationship, they had become friends.

He gave the little screen a cock-eyed smile, and hit send.  A response came more quickly than he’d expected—a ringing phone, followed by Mycroft’s dry, witty drawl.

“Oh, come, Inspector. You know perfectly well your record is sterling, your recommendations are in order, your superiors prepared for your transition, and your background and experience perfectly suited to two thirds of the different programs the College of Policing offers. You honestly don’t need me to check you’ve filled the forms out properly.”

If he’d sounded annoyed, Lestrade would have backed off. Instead, Mycroft sounded amused, and even faintly fond, much as he did when twitting Sherlock on a good day—on one of the rare days when the two were more or less in accord. That being the case, Lestrade risked pushing harder.

“Yeah, sure, you can say that from there. But I’ll still feel a lot better with a second pair of eyes going over it all. Make sure I don’t forget anything critical. Or write something stupid.”

Holmes gave a melodramatic sigh, then said, still with good humor, “Oh, very well. Diogenes in half an hour? I’ll have them bring you up to my private rooms. That way we can talk.”

Lestrade honestly would have preferred a booth at one of his favorite pubs. But he was the one asking a favor—and in all honesty, Holmes’ private rooms at the Diogenes were glorious. Though why he maintained a small apartment at the club when his own flat was across the way on Pall Mall never ceased to bewilder him.

“Yeah, ok. Sure. Half an hour. Ta. Laters…” He closed the mobile, gathered up all the paperwork, slipped it into his seldom-used briefcase, and left.

The cab brought him over promptly. The silent servitors saw him up the lift and down the hall to Mycroft’s rooms. A faint tap was enough to bring Mycroft to the door, silently gesturing his guest in.

“Lestrade…” Mycroft gestured to a pair of club chairs by a tiny enclosed wall-stove: the kind with a glass window in, showing the flicker of the flames.

“Greg,” Lestrade said, slipping off his overcoat and jacket. He let Holmes take them, as he dropped into one chair. He set his briefcase on his lap, grasped the entire stack of papers, and exchanged them with Mycroft, accepting a small snifter filled with golden liquor in its place. Mycroft, papers in one hand and another snifter in the other, settled with poise and grace into the free chair. He pretended not to watch Lestrade, shuffling through the papers instead, his glances hidden by lowered lashes.

Lestrade was only half aware of the attention. He was tired, and his nerves had been gnawing at him for days, and for the first time in too long he was out of his jacket and down to his shirtsleeves, with a comfy chair, a warm fire, and a glass of something that he knew would be good, whatever it was.

He took a long, slow sip—and froze. It was good. Very good. But… He let it linger, thought about it, swallowed, drawing in his breath to catch the scent before it was gone. He pondered.

“Calvados?” he asked, tentatively.

“Oh, very good—wrong, but still, a good deduction. Laird’s twelve-year-old apple brandy. American, believe it or not.” He sipped his own, and let out a contended sigh. “Not bad for the colonies.”

Lestrade risked a chuckle. “Turbocharged cider, yeah. I’ll take it.” It suited the evening. It suited his weariness, and his longing for comfort.

They fell silent, needing no small talk. Mycroft flipped pensively through Lestrade’s paperwork, stopping on occasion, jotting notes on post-its he then stuck in the margins of the forms.  He wore reading glasses. Greg, himself long-since forced into his first pair, smiled at the sight, feeling a comfortable affection for that little sign of encroaching age. He closed his eyes, and tallied them up between them: his hair gone all frost-white and steel grey. His glasses. His tired feet and tetchy knees. The first traces of arthritis in the lower joints of his thumbs.  Mike’s hair inching back from his forehead, the brackets forming around his wide mouth, his ginger hair darkening and going closer and closer to russet brown. And of course, reading glasses of his own. If you were to believe him, his mind was no longer quite so quick as it once was, though Lestrade was hard put to see it. He smiled, sipped, and drifted, lulled by the hiss and crackle of the fire and the slow flip of paper and scratch of the fine-lead mechanical pencil Mycroft used to take notes. He could not swear he hadn’t been sleeping when at last Mike cleared his throat.

“Huh-whuh?”

“It looks good,” Mycroft said, patiently…as though he had said it before, but was more amused than annoyed at having to say it again.

“Th’ application. Right…” Lestrade sat up, setting aside the now-empty snifter. “Didn’t make a dog’s dinner of it all?”

“Hardly. I’ve suggested rephrasing on the two essay portions—minor, but more likely to please HR personnel. I’d ask Mildred Hanson in MI6 for a recommendation, rather than your second MI5 choice. Or as well-as. Mildred’s better with words, though, and she thinks quite well of you, while Mr. Lombard has the verbal talent of a drunken Cossack and he hates admitting anyone he didn’t train and handle has offered anything in the past twenty years. He doesn’t insult you…but you can do better. Your CV is good. If you wish it to be excellent I’ve given you the name of an expert who can make even someone like my brother look like he’s got a respectable background. But these are niceties. You have done well—and your life and your records prove you to be a man worthy of consideration.”

Lestrade felt a big, dumb grin grow and take over his face. A dopey grin, he suspected…but some of the fear dropped away, and was replaced with a glowing sense of joy and pride. “You really think so?”

Mycroft pursed his lips reprovingly. “I’d hardly say it if I didn’t.”

“Yeah, right. Like you always say what you think instead of what’s expedient.” Lestrade chuckled as honesty overtook hurt feelings, and Mycroft straightened first in annoyance—then wilted slightly as he reckoned a fair hit. “Nah, nah, it’s all right, Mike. I trust you.”

Pale eyes rose and met his, grateful, and Mycroft risked another smile. “Well, in that case…I suppose I am flattered.” He rose, and offered the papers back, then stood at the arm of Lestrade’s chair as the older man flipped through the application, commenting and clarifying on his post-its as they read it over together.

“You really did like it,” Lestrade said as they reached the end.

“What’s not to like?” Mycroft looked down. His hands cradled the snifter, each wrapping half in a graceful curl. “You’ve lived an exemplary life, Detective Chief Inspector Gregory Samuel Lestrade. Your application and record only give testimony to what I already knew of you.”

“Only because you’re secret squirrel to the very heart, and you’ve already ransacked my background,” Lestrade said, teasing, as he put the application back in his briefcase. He glanced up. “You did do a background check when I started working with Sherlock, didn’t you?”

Mycroft shrugged. “Guilty, I’m afraid.”

“Nah—I expected as much even then,” Lestrade said, laughing. He held up the glass. “But if you want to do penance, you can pour me some more of that. Good stuff, Maynard.”

“Mycroft.”

“Sorry…old joke,” Lestrade said, and watched the other man cross the room, fill their glasses, and saunter back. “Sherlock must hate you for that one inch you grew beyond him,” he said, laughing. “I know I envy the two inches you have on me.”

“Back aches, bad knees, and a center of gravity high enough to put me at a constant disadvantage in hand to hand combat,” Mycroft said, handing him the refilled snifter. “You land in the golden zone—tall enough that most women must still look up to you, short enough not to suffer the complications of being ‘too tall.’” He paused, then, holding his own glass, watching Lestrade’s face.

The silence danced.

Neither spoke…but something passed between them.

Words were complicated. Decisions, though, often were not.

Lestrade let the scorching fire of distilled apple brandy pour down his throat. He felt his body come alive, tingling in anticipation.

His medical records had been in the pile, he thought. Mycroft would have been free to read the entire set of tests and bloodwork he’d had done—including the one that declared him free of all STDs. As for him, he trusted the other man to say if he was a carrier of anything of moment.

“This can go any way we like, can’t it,” he said, just in case he was wrong. Wrong about diseases, wrong about Mycroft’s attraction…

Mycroft gave him a wicked, sharp look that suggested a grin, even if his mouth didn’t actually move a micrometer. “I suspect the answer to that is ‘yes.’” His eyes were dark suddenly—pupils dilated, swallowing up the pale blue iris.

“C’mere,” Lestrade said, and scooted to one side of his chair, leaving a wedge of space between the arm and Lestrade’s thigh.

Mycroft didn’t hesitate. One knee dropped into the empty space, carrying his weight. One arm rested on their chair-back, steadying the hand that held the brandy glass. The other slid around Lestrade’s neck. “You’re sure,” he husked.

Lestrade didn’t waste words—just stretched upward and took Mycroft’s mouth, licking gently at his lower lip, sliding an around his waist.

Neither was ignorant, or inexperienced. Both were hungry—deeply, achingly hungry.

Later, struggling to remember, Lestrade decided that it was too fast, hot, and rough to easily dissect—but too tender and too much savored by both men to be a blur without specifics.

Mycroft had shaved before Lestrade arrived. His skin was like smooth satin, and he smelled of clean, light cologne. Lestrade was less couth—his five-o’clock shadow well along, gritting against Mycroft’s collar as they kissed, nuzzled, nipped. He wasn’t even going to try guessing if his aftershave had made it through the day. As Mycroft eased further up, swinging his leg over and straddling Lestrade’s lap, he growled, gripped tight, struggled with Lestrade’s tie left from earlier in the day.

Lestrade eased his hands under the other man’s jumper, feeling magically soft wool on the backs of his hands, supple cotton under his fingers, and warm, long-lined muscle beneath that. Mycroft’s nipples seemed indifferent to his attentions, but when he scraped his nails over the other man’s ribs he called forth a growling moan that more than made up for it. He could feel the other man’s package, heavy and full and firm, cradled in the crease where his thighs came together.

He was as hard.

He twisted his hands, gathered the hem of Mycroft’s jumper, and slipped it over the other man’s head. In return Mycroft finished with the tie and began a flying pass over his button placket, opening up Lestrade’s shirt with an efficiency that was near military in its determined advance.

There were few words—and those were limited to pleasure and pragmatism. “More.” “Here? Good?” “Yes.” “Do you want…” “Just shut up and do it.”

The rest was gasps, sobs, gulping groans and longing.

“Get your arse up…need these _off.”_

 _“_ Fine. Want me to join you down there?”

“No. Just make room…”

“Ohmygod.”

A smug, muffled chuckle rose from between Lestrade’s legs.

He gave himself to it—sparing only enough mind to start planning how to return the favor.

Mycroft knew what he was doing.

Of course he did. He was Mycroft. He’d have put in extra effort to make sure anything intelligence could address was addressed. After that it was physical skill….but he wasn’t a baby, and he’d been at the game years….

It was like going blind and running mad and getting totally pissed all at once. The room spun. The details did country dances—allemande-left, and swing. It was hot-wet-suction, slippery-sliding, tickle-me-dearie…

He was sliding down the club chair, arse in mid-air, Mycroft wrapped around his cock, wrapped around his hips, holding them both up as he carried them to a screaming finish, then easing Lestrade down until they sat facing each other, leaning on each other, Lestrade panting his fulfillment into Mycroft’s shoulder.

“Good,” he gasped. “Oh, God. Good…”

“Mmmmm.” A cat in the creamery couldn’t sound more smug.

Lestrade laughed, and pulled his lover roughly into a tight hug. “You bastard.”

“I love you, too.”

They both froze—one hesitant, unsettled second. They both relaxed.

“Yeah, you do,” Lestrade whispered. “You’re lucky it’s mutual.”

It was Mycroft’s turn to hide his face in his lover’s shoulder.

Lestrade began the slow dance of returned affection, hands gliding, wandering, helping Mycroft out of the remains of his clothes. Shirt off. Trousers.

“Heh. I win—I had a bet with myself that you were boxers. It was that or tighty-whities.”

“You didn’t think of me in a thong, then?”

“Too practical. Why chafe your arse when you’re hoping to use it for something later?”r

Mycroft gave a shout of laughter—unheard of and glorious. Lestrade pulled him down, wrapped him close, stroked his flanks, found his cock. Touched and traced and smiled to himself as Mycroft moaned and rocked into his palm.

“Show me what you like, lover.”

Mycroft guided Lestrade’s hand, showed him the rhythm, set the beat. Curled his fingers, then eased his hand away, letting his lover explore.

He pressed his face tight into the turn of Lestrade’s neck.

Lestrade played, delighted with his lover. This wasn’t what he’d planned, or even considered. But it was what he’d wanted…even if he’d never admitted it to himself. Mycroft.

Lestrade smiled to himself, experiencing Mycroft Holmes—fierce, brilliant, assertive. Adaptive, responsive, vulnerable.

Mycroft shaking in his arms.

Mycroft raking his hips up, into his palm.

Mycroft, incoherent, muttering in the turn of his neck.

Mycroft, determined…now-now-now-now…

Oh.

Ooooooh.

And done. They were done.

Mycroft, without even a flinch, dragged out his smooth cotton shirt and wiped them both clean—or clean enough.

“The shower’s down the way. You can join me, or clean up in the spare bath. Your pick.”

“Join,” Lestrade said.

“Not shy?”

Lestrade chuckled. “After that? What’s left to hide?”

Mycroft laughed softly.

As they stood in the shower washing, more side-by-side than one at a time, Lestrade said, “Well. Not what I’d planned. But damned fine….”

“Speak for yourself.”

“It wasn’t fine?” He felt a flutter of worry…

“You may not have planned, but I certainly did.”

Lestrade laughed, and gave his lover a noogie, ignoring Mycroft’s indignant squall. “Holmes. How did I end up loving a Holmes?”

“That’s just good taste,” Mycroft said, sudsing his hair and grinning. “The real question is how you got a Holmes to love you back.”

“Luck.”

Mycroft paused, then, and said, softly, “Nothing of the sort. Quality.”

They were both silent—then Lestrade stole the tube of shampoo and Mycroft rinsed and they both turned away from the sheer intensity of the moment.

But neither forgot…and never would.

Luck. Planning. Quality.

Love.


End file.
